Bhubaneswar: Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on Tuesday said his government would make the State Vigilance more powerful to ensure a corruption-free Odisha.
“In pursuit of the goal to provide efficient and corruption free administration to the people of Odisha, my government has, over the years, created and strengthened several institutional mechanism to channel complaints of people into concrete actions in order to combat and eradicate corruption from the public life,” he said while addressing the Vigilance Awareness Week celebration at Rabindra Mandap in the city here.
The chief minister said the real objective of having a clean and transparent mechanism requires system strengthening.
“The system works between the public who need to avail services from the government and the officials who provide the service for the government. This system of service delivery needs to be strengthened persistently with appropriate mechanism. With the implementation of RTI Act and various transparency measures, the state government is trying to empower the people and build up a strong mechanism. Besides, it has taken several initiatives like e-payments, e-tendering, Right to Public Service Act, single window system, payment of wages and benefits through bank payments, involvement of beneficiaries in monitoring mechanism, community involvement and involvement of PRIs, and an appropriate grievance redressal mechanism”, Patnaik observed.
Justifying that the continued emphasis of the state government on effective prosecution in courts has started yielding rich dividends, the chief minister said the conviction percentage in Vigilance cases has reached a record 48 percent this year.
“The investigators and prosecutors of the department deserve appreciation and they should carry forward such good work,” he added.
In his address, chief secretary GC Pati said the Vigilance department is constantly upgrading its domain and expertise in the investigation of complex cases. These include successful investigation into mining cases thereby creating huge impact in preventing illegal mining in the state. Besides, its successful attachment of properties worth several hundred crores of the accused as per the provisions of the law gives ample testimony to its efforts to prevent corrupt practices.
Speaking on the occasion, director, State Vigilance KB Singh informed that the Vigilance would set up a technical team which will keep an eye on major contract works in the state.
“Besides, we have decided to put all information in the Vigilance website to inform the people about our activities”, he added.
On the occasion, the chief minister released a special postal cover and released a short film on Vigilance Helpline-1064. He also conducted a pledge taking on transparency by officers and awarded several officers for their performance.